Like most golf-obsessed teenagers my school text-books were filled with little drawings of golf holes. They were mostly nonsensical holes; full of water, trees in the middle of fairways, 90 degree doglegs and of course island greens. And for a time there the back page was reserved for tournaments against my best mate, on an 18 hole ‘championship’ course using the ‘pen-flick’ method. Standing the pen upright with your index finger and starting at the tee , you pushed the nib forward, to make your shot. Finish in the trees, 1 shot penalty. In the water, well that was two shots. That, I guess, was my introduction to golf course design and drawing golf holes.
My dad was an artist and both he and my mum taught art at high school so from early on I was introduced to the finer aspects of drawing and painting. For a long time though I picked up art only to put it down again. It wasn’t until I got into golf course design in my early 20’s that there was a reason to draw.
These days its not always practical to do a lot of drawing in design – perhaps just a line sketch or a few scratches in the dirt to talk through ideas in the field. But I still like to do some artwork in my spare time and as they’ve become more popular it’s a become a more serious hobby…..golfrenderings.com.au